I love winter. The crowds diminish, but everyone is so much into having fun, they lay down their guard and become easy pickings.

Take my latest. I found him nosing around the Cotton Exchange, being rude to all God's creatures. Before anything is said on his behalf, drunk as a skunk is not an excuse.

Being New Year's, he decided to dress for success. It had been unseasonably warm in Georgia. Therefore, my sorry new friend had the best reason to wear the mild weather equivalent of an ugly holiday sweater.

He went for black from head to toe, interrupted by obnoxious bleeding patterns in his t-shirt that read "Have a Murderous Christmas and a Hellish New Year." A couple of red horns peeked from the side of a jolly old hat tilted over the "M", in case someone missed on the punny side of things. That made me chuckle. Most Satanists I know are quiet, no nonsense folk.

After all, this is Savannah.

There he was, all alone in one of those few nights in which company is instinctively craved after. Bless his soul... trying to uncover the secrets of the red brick Freemasons' hall with the camera shutter of his smart phone, and being loud and unruly on top. No one, no one flips the bird to the nice trolley drivers working ungodly hours and walks away unscathed. They do enough driving those orange and green monstrosities down streets meant for horse and carriage, all to keep us from twisting an ankle.

A classic move was needed. Stumbling upon him, hand raised to my chest in surprise, I made that first eye contact. There was also a point in brushing aside the small golden cross that rested bellow my collarbone, just to see if his eyes got distracted by... shiny.

"Oh, my! I didn't see you there! Apologies."

"And what do we have here?" He said, as if begging for an audience. "I found me a sandal wearing, sweet tea drinking, church going Southern girl. Just like the doctor ordered." He had a saucy smile, and there was a sweetness of liquor slipping through his pores, something infused with apple pie and cinnamon sticks that proved him young and tricked him into thinking he could hold his liquor. It was almost enough to feel sorry.

"Oh, I like men that are straight up about what they want." No. I didn't. It was rude, but it was worth letting it slip. Introducing myself as Maggie, I let him know that my given name is Magnolia, but I rather leave that to the trees. He laughed out loud and I smiled with my mouth closed, aiming for endearing.

"And so, Satan's Little Helper." I stretched that o in "so" as much as I could, making sure he'd understand I didn't care for introductions in return. The sight of relief in his face was worth a million bucks. "What are you doing on your own in New Year's Eve? Here on vacation, I bet. It's all fun until people start huddling up for midnight cuddles and you haven't hooked up yet." I repaid that directness of him with a little nudge of my own, leaving aside my thoughts on his fashion sense. After all, I wanted him to sign on my tour.

"You can say that. What about you? I don't think you just landed here. You sound like everybody else."

Foul and a half, this one. Still, tinsel, twinkling lights and count downs worked wonders on my mood.

"Don't count me out. There's a lot of holes in the Bible Belt. I'm here on holiday as well." I half-way lied. I was born in Atlanta. If given a choice, I might had not opted for Georgia's internal tourism. I would have gone back to places I loved or travel to those I dreamt of, but a certain someone made sure I'd be bound to this place... Still, you won't catch me frowning. A forced vacation is still a vacation of sorts.

It was late. Past midnight meant everyone, including tourists, were holed up in the comfort of their rooms. Y'all need to understand we are not as festive as New Orleans, or as unhinged as New York. River Street was quiet, and a waning moon did its best against the winks of Christmas lights to leave a mark on the old brick stairs that lead to the water front. Call me nostalgic, but that glow that starts artificial and somehow plays off the water at the canal, swaying along with the illusion of life is just...dreamy.

"This is dead," he whispered. The tip of his tongue brushed against my earlobe. He was right. We were moving away from the tipsy left overs of River Walk. At this point, there were not even vehicles blocking our way. I pushed him to the side, 'cause a good girl must always give herself some space.

"You must like dead, frisky you." This no name business was getting ridiculous. "Otherwise, you'd be falling on your butt at the sky ring on the Civic Center that's where they are carrying the New Year rounds of hoopla this year."

He tripped, either not used to the uneven cobblestones or slightly more affected by drinks than he'd care to admit. I like to play with them, so I gave him a chance to make me repent, as we made our way on to the walk by the canal, passing a series of mementos from the Civil War and a giant anchor bleeding rust on to the name of those lost at sea, good men that never made it back to port.

"Have you been to Jones Street?" I asked, giving him a chance to make it out of the night alive. "People come from all over to see their winter displays they call it the most beautiful street in America." I had an agenda, but I could have spared a moment trying to capture that elusive sense of wonder.

"Fuck your winter wonderlands." Mr. Smooth kept outdoing himself. "Back there you promised me a ghost tour with a happy ending." I paused for a moment. I was not shocked, just doing a quick review of all my little lies. I'm not big on happy endings. If I promised, I surely crossed my heart and he probably thought I was putting myself on display. But I did guarantee a little scare. I twirled, opening my arms, framing a picture.

"And here it is. A place that holds more secrets than your brick house. Sure, it is not protected by a winged lion, but that collie is pretty fierce, if you ask me."

He looked at The Waiving Girl, not quite getting it.

"Yeah. I heard about it. That's the chick that used to shake a towel at the passing ships until the day she died. Crazy."

"Not really waving, you know," I answered. "She commended them to the sea, wishing for a safe return. There are things out there that might kill you. The city missed her after she was gone and cast her out in bronze. Blessed sailors and their superstitions..." I tried to keep my spirits up, but melancholy caught up. Damn festivities, they affect our kind as much as mortals. The nights are a little longer and one can't help but think of the stuff we left behind. Or worse, those who left us stranded. For the first time since we crossed paths, I told him nothing but the truth.

"Sometimes I feel like the Waiving Girl, bound to a duty, until he comes for me."

"Who?" He might have been honestly concerned, but it was a little too late.

"Jackson. It's been a hundred and fifty years and I still miss him. While he comes back, I'm working on a memorial of my own..."

There was no escape. The moment a vampire reveals itself, there's intent to kill and whomever crosses its path is no better than a deer in headlights. Sometimes I glamour them, out of pity. Had he been better, he would have gone with a flutter of eyelids, thinking the brush of lips against his skin was no more than a belated, but well-earned midnight kiss.

But all this waiting has made me cruel in my impatience. I took it out on him. Every hour of every night of my forced stay in Savannah. His last memory was ice cold against the pulse of his vein and deep pain as my teeth tore through. I drank, and took more than blood. I tasted his surprise, the hurt, the realization of bitter submission and defeat. All in one gulp.

Scared tasted a whole lot better.

I must confess, deep down, he was sweet. They all are. No one is terrible when faced with a monster. I wrapped up his body and chained it well, letting it slip to the point where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Savannah River. The water is deep and murky and he'd be at peace, along with the others, bled dry and chained to the bottom.

***

"Happy New Year to you, young man." I sighed. "I made a Christmas promise to be good, but soon recanted. There are degrees of naughty on the list and I'm a little ahead of those who get a lump of coal. My January resolutions are none the better..." The night, being young still, was full of promise. I was ready to go home and change, perhaps head down to Market Street, when I stumbled upon a friend.

I know you might be thinking, the damned have no friends. But when you live as long as I have anything can happen. Eventually one might snack on a special snowflake that has no qualms on staying behind, to keep you company. And there's no kinder soul, or better reflecting shard if ice deprived of a body than that of Reverend Silpher.

"Good evening, Magnolia. What brings you to old haunts after midnight?" Seeing the good ole' holy roller is always a little more unnerving that meeting one of my kind. Ghost can't get rid of the clothes they died on, and those plaid pants...

"Hey, Rev Sulphur. Still afraid of what lies on the other side? You cannot keep using me as an excuse. Eventually, it'll break my cold, dark heart." I did my most odious pout and head tilt routine, but the sanctimonious specter got a whiff of misery behind my little theater. I still have to meet someone capable of stopping a preacher from dishing it out during the holidays.

"I will pretend it is the first time I hear that witty adaptation of my last name, and grant a titter. If only it will lead you to confess." The breeches, the language. No matter what they tell you, boys and girls, the nineteenth century was not cut out for romance. Take if from someone who lived through it.

"Nothing to confess. Empowered by a girl's solo night out, I went on a pub crawl. I took it slow, steady and won the race." The Rev grimaced, a vestigial response from when he had a sense of smell. Words must have conjured the idea of alcohol.

"And now, as plain as sight, you are inebriated in ways that are not common to your kind. It is not just blood. You drank his fear and also his euphoria, his need, his..."-a cocked eyebrow warned of evident disapproval- wishful thinking about getting to know you this night."

"Nice touch with the biblical sense. Aren't you glad I rid Savannah of his lecherous bastardy?" I think my insolence dispelled him a little. Silpher was right. I drank a little too much and Satan's Little Helper got branded on my tongue."

"You are deflecting Magnolia. Most vampires drink blood without brushing the soul, but you do. And ever since I met you, you've been careful not to do so, except in times in which you are striving to forget."

I hated him so, for reading me so well.

"How much do you know, Rev? I'm undead, and the veil is something I canhardly touch, but you come and go as you please, never knocking at doors forfear one might open... In your time in between, have you ever seen ithappen?" It just became evident that myplans for the night had been interrupted. While talking to the ghost I made aright on to East Liberty and ended roaming in the place I tried to avoid allnight. No killing, no holiday leisure could keep me away for long. "Is it true?That if a vampire makes its way to the steps of a church in the first hours of NewYear's Day, it will be able to conjure anyone, living or dead?"

Silpher's eyes misted. "I thought I knew, but now I must say I'm not so sure about a church as a seat of power. I still believe in this night, and in the power of prayer. I still talk to God even though He doesn't answer. Maybe if you trust enough, somewhere, someone might hear you..."

He was there and then he was not. Silpher disappeared before my eyes as moonlight hid beneath the clouds. The only thing that was left to attest of his presence was the sweet smell of peaches and honey. He had invited me into his home and offered a square of cobbler and a glass of wine the night I killed him. Damned ghost never allowed me to put that one on the back burner.

A this point there was very little left of the happy girl that kicked off the night. I climbed the steps of St. John's Cathedral and closed my eyes. "Jackson... are you still there?... Can you hear me?"

-----

LynnS13 is a Wattpader through and through; a Content Ambassador with a knack for sending fanfic in the right direction, a vampire aficionado and a published author, though she still can't believe it. Her highly deceptive title "A Court for Fairies" is actually a vampire book and available right now.

Magnolia and Jackson have been going around her head for quite a time now, and one of these days, they'll step out shorts into a mix of historical fiction and dark fantasy titled Edge of Midnight. In the meantime, let's hope you all enjoyed Maggie's version of holiday fun.

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